Joint Fisheries Management in the Barents Sea after Russias Invasion of Ukraine

Since the mid-1970s, Norway and Russia have managed the rich fish resources of the Barents Sea jointly, including the world’s largest cod stock. The achievements of the Joint Norwegian–Russian Fisheries Commission are widely regarded as a golden standard for international fisheries management. However, with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, an entirely new situation has arisen. Russia is no longer part of the international marine scientific community or joint fisheries enforcement with other states to the extent that it was before. Indeed, it has threatened to suspend the quota sharing arrangements with Norway, which is the foundation of the fisheries cooperation between the two states. This has stirred up unprecedented legal and political uncertainties whose outcomes are far from certain. JOINTFISH BARENTS investigates the nature and implications of those uncertainties, legally and politically. In the study of the law of the sea, the project contributes to the interpretation of the legal duty states have to cooperate in the management of shared fish stocks. In the field of international relations, the project investigates how resilient the Barents Sea management cooperation is in the face of geopolitical change. The project group also monitors developments in Russian fisheries politics, management and debate, drawing on Russian primary sources. In terms of theory, the project aims to provide analytical advances within and between disciplines and sub-disciplines, primarily between legal and political science research but also between subdisciplines within political science. The core project team receives inputs on the status of the Barents Sea fish stocks from a marine science expert group.

Since the mid-1970s, Norway and Russia have managed the rich fish resources of the Barents Sea jointly, including the world’s largest cod stock. The achievements of the Joint Norwegian–Russian Fisheries Commission (JNRFC) are widely regarded as a golden standard for international fisheries management. However, with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, an entirely new situation has arisen. Russia is no longer part of the international marine scientific community or joint fisheries enforcement with other states. Indeed, it has threatened to suspend the quota arrangements of the JNRFC, which is the foundation of the bilateral regime. This has stirred up unprecedented legal and political uncertainties whose outcomes are far from certain. JOINTFISH BARENTS will investigate the nature and implications of those uncertainties, legally and politically. This will be done within the framework of a tightly integrated academic endeavour, with high ambitions empirically, theoretically and methodologically. Empirically, we will monitor developments in Russian fisheries politics, management and debate, drawing on Russian primary sources. In terms of theory, the project will provide analytical advances within and between disciplines and sub-disciplines, primarily between legal and political science research but also between subdisciplines within political science. In the study of the law of the sea, the project will contribute to the interpretation and operationalization of the legal duty of coastal states to cooperate in the management of shared fish stocks. In the field of international relations (IR), investigations of the resilience of the Barents Sea management regime will be combined with analysis of geopolitical implications. The core project team will also receive inputs on stock status from a marine science expert group. As regards methodology, the project will explore the interface between legal doctrinal method and social science interpretive methodology.